1 Year at Toonzone

Decided to take of the letter ending off of the numbers. Didn't seem too special so I just removed it. *shrugs*

Ok. Today marks the 1 year anniversary of myself joining ToonZone, so I thought I'd take the time to reflect on my time there, the good, the bad, the ugly. How I came to be there, what I did there. I think this look back will either be entertaining or boring as hell. So let's see.

How did I come to Toonzone?
Well I guess that's a good enough place as any to start with. Sometime in 2002, I started watching Cartoon Network more than I usually did (I finally got access to cable in 2000), I was watching for some of the old shows that I loved back in the day, Sailor Moon, SilverHawks, ThunderCats, and I'd tune in every week day to watch it. Soon enough I began to become fascinated with the Toonami block, and once those old shows went off the air, I decided to look around online to find out if they would be coming back anytime soon. Trying to be more specific in my search, I looked under Toonami sites at some search engine (probably Yahoo, this was before I became a google follower). Anyway, I found this site called CNX: Toonami. I was so fascinated with the site, I would read Jeff Harris's articles whenever they were posted and learned more about Toonami. One day I wondered if there was anything else on this great site. Exploring the menu bar, I saw this link called Toonzone, curious, I clicked on it and it led me to the Toonami Board on Toonzone. This was about late December of 2002. For the next few months, I would occassionally click on that link and lurk on the TZ board, reading posts that entertained me like from posters like Waggytoon. I would laugh reading some of the interesting discussions that went on. Finally after a few months of looking, I finally decided the place was good enough to merit registering as a member, thus on March 11, 2003 I registered. My first post came either that day or a day later, in the Toonami board, about Goku's height in dragonball (It was before the King Piccolo saga, and his height seemed to keep changing).

What did I do at Toonzone early on? (First 6 months)
Ok Well, after that first post, I mainly took the position of a lurker, mainly a Toonami board lurker. I think my next post came two months later in some other Toonami board, during that time I started exploring other parts of the Toonzone forums, reading other topics and becoming more interested in the place. I began posting slightly more around June of 03, posting in some talkback threads, where I started to notice the passion and talent of a fellow TZ member, DianaGohan. I started becoming fascinated with her posts and ideas and opinions and always looked forward to her posts on the forum.

The Golden Era of Toonzone for me (4 months Sep- december)
Why Do I call this my golden era? Because this was when I was my most active and became a solid (IMO) member of TZ. I made TZ the homepage of my browser and started logging in and posting regularly. No coincidence this was just a bit after I became intrigued with DianaGohan's opinions, I began to feel that she was making conversations easier to talk about and I regularly happened to post in threads that she as well posted in. I began to post regularly in other parts of TZ, becoming more varied in what I wanted to talk about I posted whenever I had a chance. Soon it became a daily thing as DianaGohan and myself would review the latest episode of DragonBall and it was definitely interesting takes we took on the show. We began to become friendly on the boards during this time and would communicate to each other occasionally on the forums, answering a question or just commenting on something the other said. DianaGohan was notoriously known for posting quite often (I'm not going to comment on this because she knows how I felt on that subject), anyway because of all the conversations she'd made more interesting and such, I began posting at a high frequency myself, by december I was averaging 100 posts a week, and it wasn't me forcing to post, I was just naturally posting where I wanted to post. I began talking to DianaGohan through PM's regularly in December around her birthday.. A few weeks later I started PM'ing TZ member Corrado at first due to concerns on his possible departure and I wanted him to know that I appreciated his opinion on TZ and such. I also had begun talking to Knux Five of Toonami board and I was having a great time on TZ. But unfortunately the careless fun didn't last long after an incident on the evening of Dec 29. That night is when I became good friends with TZ member Anime Guy, we talked for a good amount of hours leading into the morning that day. After that night, TZ was never the same for me again.

The last Two Months
After what happened to end December, January was very much an awkward time for me on TZ. I soon was awakened to the idiots of TZ, and their senseless views. My niaveness of the forum had left the board, (Started feeling this in December) some tried to pass it off as people just being bitchy because of the holidays, but when it was focused on one member.. I couldn't take it anymore. Actually this right now was in early December, I remember the members getting uppity because of this members views and soon were acting mean towards this member and I couldn't take it.. I said something, I should've said a hell of a lot more, but for me to say something was pretty big since I usually just mind my business, but I just couldn't take how they piled on this nice member. Back to January, and I had gotten a real taste of this attitude, as a member decides to "dance on the grave" of this member who no longer was able to defend on the forums. I ripped into that idiot, standing up and saying I wasn't going to take any of that shit. Although now that I look back, I wish I said something harsher, gotten at least a warning from the mods or something, I felt I said what I said to nicely.. Anyway I reported it to the mods but nothing happened. Nothing. This member again said something in another thread on another forum.. but more vaguely.. I reported that post as well, explaining my reasoning.. but again.. Nothing fucking happened.. This is when I realized how Jaded TZ could be. That there seemed to have been a stigma built up against this member I was trying to defend and that upset me.. It's just a friggin forum. *sigh* Soon enough I took things into my hands, all nothing dealing with Toonzone, and after that, I've started to settle back in. Although TZ will never be the same.. But I'll be there for the foreseeable future.

I've had good times, bad times, and ugly times at Toonzone, but I don't regret joining. I've met the love of my life because of that place, and that fact has made my life the happiest it's ever been. I've become a better person, a more creative person, and now I have someone on my arm that I can enjoy life with.. This year on TZ has been great.. It's definitely changed my life. That's why I thought I'd look back.